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Interviews conducted by the Oral History Program are based on a standardized list of questions (called a protocol) arranged in major interview categories. Select a category to see interviews and the interview protocol for that category.

Farm and Ranch Folks

Our largest interview category is Farm & Ranch Folks. The standard interview protocol covers an overview of family members and history, including how they came to the farm/ranch, a description of the farm/ranch, activities that take place there, daily life, community life, and how hard times were dealt with.

Baca has been a breeder of Spanish Heritage horses for fifty years in the Belen/Tomé Land Grant area, where he was born. Includes several discussions about his Spanish Heritage horses and those developed or claimed by others. Also discusses points of local history, including route of El Camino Real and the Oñate Trail through his neighborhood.

Pablo Bernal was a rancher in Northeastern NM for 70 years (1912–1982). He discusses livestock raising and marketing. Also discusses his father's history, which included being forced off the Maxwell Land Grant circa 1897.

Black discusses ranch life and working on a ranch prior to a career as a livestock inspector for the N.M. Livestock Board. He describes his job in the field, and as a supervisor. He is also a graduate of auctioneer school.

Grandfather ranched near Pastura, NM. Father herded sheep as a boy in the Las Vegas, NM area. Father inherited a ranch from his employer and built it up to include acreage in dry farming, and sheep and cattle. He describes growing up in Pastura.

Attended local schools and graduated from N.M.A&M in 1941 with a degree in mechanical engineering. He spent most of the war years working for Stoddard Aircraft Radio in Los Angeles, during which time he met and married his first wife, Gloria Fountain. Shortly before the war ended they moved back to the Las Cruces area. He was a pecan farmer for many years and also served three terms as the mayor of Mesilla. Also, during the latter part of World War II he had some contact with prisoners of war working on various local farms.

Speaks extensively on rural education, family ranch and farm home life, ranching community life, and successful cattle breeding. Discusses family's businesses, including managing the College Ranch [Jornada experimental range] for New Mexico State.

Reviews parents' arrivals (1930s) and lives. Mostly focuses on Keller's career as a forage farmer and working at the Coronado Cattle Company. Today works on an all-natural beef project and interactions with racehorse industry. Was a charter member of the N.M. Farm & Ranch Heritage Institute and helped lobby for legislation that created the Museum.

Father's veterinarian practice in Roswell beginning in 1926. Her education was in public school and college in Silver City, N.M., and Emporia, Kan. The bulk of the interview details the consultant's experience on a cattle ranch in the Caprock area of Southeastern New Mexico, 1943-1955.

Early homesteads of family. Means of earning a living by raising cattle, goats, pigs and growing apples, etc. Early schooling, household chores, making clothes, and recreational activity. Activities in World War II and founding of Bear Mountain Ranch School.

Mrs. Bessie Gibson relates her family background and that of her husband, Jim Gibson. She tells of her childhood in Texas and New Mexico. Most of the interview focuses on her life in the Farmington, N.M., area before and after her marriage.

Hille discusses coming to New Mexico in the 1920s. He worked on a number of ranches in southern New Mexico, and homesteaded in the 1930s. During World War II he worked in the defense industry, but returned to New Mexico in 1945. He started a welding business and also purchased two ranches in southern New Mexico.

Originally a dairyman in Texas, Raymond Jarratt has been a New Mexico dairyman since 1956 when he moved from Texas to work for Valley Gold Dairy. He has been an independent dairy farm owner since 1958. He presently owns and operates a 350-acre dairy in Los Lunas and sells to Dairy Farmers of America. He discusses his ancestry, farm life when he was a child in Texas, rearing his children on a dairy farm, dairy production and care of milk cows, the superiority of Ayrshire cattle over Holsteins, and droughts. Also talks about the condemnation of his land by the city to secure acreage to expand their sewer plant.

Ranching and rural life in the early to mid-twentieth century in southwestern New Mexico. Bill Jones's family raised cattle and Panzy Courtney's parents were primarily goat ranchers. Bill and Panzy together raised cattle at Wind Mountain in far southeastern New Mexico.

Includes his family history, starting with his Grandfather Kronig's arrival in Watrous in 1848 and continuing on with the consultant's experiences fighting the foot and mouth disease in Mexico in the late 1940s, working for thirty years with the Cattle Sanitary Board, serving as director of the Livestock Board (the Cattle and Sheep Sanitary Boards combined), and raising Red Angus cattle and quarter horses.

Ranching and rural life in the early to mid-twentieth century in southwestern New Mexico. Bill Jones's family raised cattle and Panzy Courtney's parents were primarily goat ranchers. Bill and Panzy together raised cattle at Wind Mountain in far southeastern New Mexico.

Covers the arrival of his great-grandfather and grandfather in New Mexico in the 1850s and provides details about his relatives. He describes life on the ranch, his schooling at the Menaul School in Albuquerque, and the various jobs he held.

Details consultant's days working on several ranches in New Mexico, including the Bell Ranch and the OX Ranch near Springer. Describes his childhood and memories of his father's ranch in the La Cinta Canyon area.

Daughter of immigrants—father from Austria and mother from Volga region of Russia. Her childhood on a subsistence farm/ranch near Maxwell, N.M. Her education (to 8th grade) in a one-room school, then she attended junior high and high school in Springer, N.M., and one year of business college in Missouri. Married George Laumbach; together they managed the Clayton Ranch near Springer from 1940-1982.

LoPopolo's life work tracing and preserving Spanish heritage horses. Through the New Mexico Horse Project, LoPopolo has done extensive research and DNA testing in an attempt to prove that the horses he has on his preserves are the direct descendants of the horses of the Spanish Conquistadors.

Discusses parents' immigration from Chihuahua, Mexico, to the United States. Father worked as a farm hand and itinerant produce peddler. Mrs. Marquez married a farm worker from Stahmann Farms and after leaving there in the late 1940s; they worked on several farms in the San Miguel area. Discusses some Mexican American traditions, foods, and use of native plants.

The McDonald Brothers Ranch, along with the other McDonald family ranches, was leased by the Army in 1942, for use by Alamogordo Bombing Range (a predecessor of the White Sands Missile Range). These ranches and others were eventually taken for permanent use by WSMR. The consultant's father's struggle to keep his ranch—including an armed, 1982 reoccupation of it—or to receive adequate compensation and the emotional fallout from their losses are described.

History of the H Bar Y Ranch in Western New Mexico. Weather conditions, improvements to the ranch (roads and water pipelines), changes in technology that improved efficiency, domestic life, and personal history. Also discussed was the consultant's ranch in Estancia and his ranching business in California. Details of the consultant's involvement in founding the New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum.

Morgan describes her years growing up in Chamberino, New Mexico, and helping with her grandfather's farm starting in the late 1940s. She was educated in the Chamberino area and in Silver City, and worked as a teacher in Las Cruces.

The Yabumotos were immigrants to the Mesilla Valley, purchasing a small farm near Chamberino in 1915. It was essentially a subsistence farm, although cotton was grown as a cash crop. Mr. Yabumoto died in 1929, leaving Koharu Yabumoto to farm and raise the children. Discussion of the farming community of Chamberino and family traditions. Toshi Yabumoto married Carl Nakayama, from a farming family near Doña Ana. The Nakayamas farmed on a large scale. She discusses some of the impact of WWII on their families.

Segovia's father worked on Stahmann Farms. Benjie recalls life as a child, growing up on Stahmann Farms, and gives insight into the everyday life, the treatment of the workers, and his feelings regarding the pecan industry at Stahmanns.

The consultant's family can be traced back to Bernardino de Sena y Valle in 1693. Mr. Sena grew up on the family dairy farm in the Albuquerque, N.M. area of Los Ranchos. He describes his childhood, education and work history, and shares the results of his many searches for information on his ancestors.

Simon describes his late start as a rancher, the uniqueness of his current ranch location, his years as a newspaper publisher and editor, and his eight years serving on the Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum Board of Directors.

Discusses the history of Jose Maria Sisneros (born 1809) from central New Mexico. Jose Maria was a buffalo hunter and an entrepreneur. He took sheep to California in 1849, and also traded along both the Santa Fe Trail and Camino Real. He also held government contracts to supply military forts with corn and other food products. Mr. Raymond Sisneros learned of Jose Maria's exploits from his father and from the storytellers, the resolaneros, when he was a child

Dorothy Smith, age 89, is owner/operator of a small, 30-acre farm/ranch operation in the growing urban area of Corrales, in the northern suburbs of Albuquerque. She operates, by herself, a small cattle operation, selling the calves annually, and growing alfalfa for winter cattle feed. It is large enough to maintain the agricultural land designation for tax purposes. In addition to the family ranch, she worked at KOB-TV in Albuquerque and was longtime Secretary-Treasurer for the New Mexico Advertising Federation.

This interview provides background information and context for the interview recorded by George E. Sims in 1983 [in the Rio Grande Historical Collections, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, N.M.]. The consultant's involvement in high school and college rodeo in the 1950s.

Interview conducted to obtain a first-person account of the use of horses in farming for the exhibit "Traditions" (1998). Includes other details of Stutts growing up on her family farm near Salem, N.M. Tape Two is her memories of Italian and German prisoners of war working on the family farm during World War II.

The consultant details his experiences in using horse-drawn agricultural equipment. Also discussed was the consultant's role as the Roosevelt County Agent during World War II when he administered the prisoner of war (POW) labor program.

Covers Mr. Vocale's emigration from Italy to West Virginia and thence to Deming, New Mexico. It includes his memories of growing up on a farm, returning to Italy to marry, and his history as a farmer and wine-maker in Deming.

The Webers are an old farm and ranching family in Northeast New Mexico. Joe's grandfather first came to region at Fort Union in the 1850s. He settled in the area, eventually establishing several businesses. Also discusses his [Joe's] life and family and the modern use of the old family farm.